Watson hits crisp verbal return
GUERNSEY’S all-time tennis great has continued to hold firm and rally back from uneven results and social media malice.
Despite Heather Watson’s disappointment at recent first-round exits in Nottingham and Birmingham, the current World No. 122 rightfully flaunted her credentials to a Twitter user berating her as a player.
‘I don’t think I’d be a professional tennis player, making a living, with these rankings, titles, and a career high of 38 if “I got knocked out in the first round every time”,’ she wrote in a public message coupled with her yearly WTA rankings.
Today she will learn her first-round Wimbledon opponent but as Watson prepares for her 10th Wimbledon outing, following wildcard selection, she has spoken out about how she had dealt with her upsetting losing streak spanning January to early May.
‘It was really depressing,’ the Sarnian recently told tennis newsletter Ubitennis.
‘I thought, you know what, I was trying my best to stay positive and I thought this is going to be the week, like “this is it, I’m going to win a match”. Nope.
‘And it just was going on for months. And it came to a point where I was thinking: “Why am I trying every day? Why am I going to these tournaments”?
‘It was a really tough time but I’m proud of myself for sticking with it and getting out of it now because right now, I really can’t complain. I’m happy in life, on the court, off the court and happy with my game.’
Watson’s marked turnaround came in winning the Fukuoka Open on the ITF circuit, after which she commented: ‘As soon as I won one match, I won the tournament. I just needed that one match to give me confidence.’
Within the short grass-court season building to Wimbledon, despite scalping two superiorly-ranked players at Surbiton to reach the quarter-final, she has since lost three straight matches.
But Watson has certainly had worse encounters than her fighting three-set loss to World No. 50 Barbora Strycova in Birmingham.
‘My coach just put it into perspective for me,’ she said.
‘He got me thinking back to some of the tournaments we were at earlier on: Indian Wells, Miami, where I could literally barely put balls in the court. When he said that, it made me laugh.
‘I am feeling like my game is there and it should come together.’
Of course, Watson has remained incredibly grateful to her fans and to the supportive home crowds gracing such tournaments.
‘When I think about it, I’m really excited – really happy to be playing on grass at these tournaments, not having to fly anywhere and having home crowd support.’
